The Angels' Share (15 page)

‘Is this why you’re so intent on getting back your home?’ Connor paused and cocked his ear to the window, like an alert dog sensing the arrival of his owner.

‘Perhaps. And perhaps it’s just because I can’t bear the thought of a stranger living within the walls of my memories.’

I watched Connor peel back the curtains and then shrug. ‘Thought someone was out there,’ he commented and then there was a sharp rap at the back door, proving him right. He excused himself, relieving me of having to explain my motives further. Would he truly understand that the more I learnt about Ethan Kinrade, the more I wanted him out of my home?

I heard voices in the kitchen, one of them a girl’s, the hairs on the back of my neck prickled.

‘Come in and get warm,’ Connor said, the voices getting closer. ‘It’s no evening to be out. Drink?’

‘I’d love one. It’s nice to be back. I’m exhausted.’ By this time, the voices were in the small living room and I turned, annoyed at having an intimate moment with Connor disturbed – especially as I was still wearing his robe – and welded my eyes to the girl’s face until it slowly dawned on me who she was. She was draped around Connor’s neck, giving him a kiss as they came into the room.

‘Ailey,’ Connor said to me, ‘this is Steph. She’s here to learn some new production methods at the distillery.’ He then turned to the fragile young creature that clung to him, brushed a strand of white-blonde hair from her face –
he touched her face
– and said, ‘Steph, this is Ailey, my best friend from when we were kids.’

Did he have to say ‘when we were kids’? Was it a temporary role that I’d fulfilled and now I was unable to be named as his best friend? Just because I’d been away for fourteen years, did that make me surplus to his emotional requirements? I was already jealous of Steph, and confused too, my brain scrabbling to thread together the bits of information that were spinning around my mind. It was rather like gathering up beads from a broken necklace. Instinctively, I held out my hand. Steph didn’t take it.

‘Steph’s been travelling around Europe for the last few months. She’s come to visit for a couple of weeks. It’s been ages, hasn’t it?’ Connor gave her a squeeze and I thought she might break. Even beneath her winter layers, she would weigh no more than seven or eight stone, and standing next to Connor, who towered over her, only emphasised her petite body. I had all these thoughts before I realised who she was.

‘Did you mention a drink?’ she giggled, her pretty Scottish accent turning up at the edges. I still gawped, failing to move up as she joined me on the sofa.

‘I’ve just had a bath,’ I said stupidly, tugging at Connor’s robe. Steph looked at it briefly and then clinked glasses with Connor. He had forgotten to refill my glass so I got up and did it myself but when I returned from the kitchen, he was sitting next to Steph, laughing and pawing at her tiny leg with his sturdy hand.

‘Well, I’m going to get dressed and then I’ll head off,’ I said. My attempt to drain my newly filled glass in only two mouthfuls exploded in a spray of realisation as I heard Steph say ‘
great sex
’, after which she dissolved into helpless giggles. It was the intonation in her voice rather than her looks that finally joined the fragments in my mind. I didn’t even have time to consider why she was talking about great sex to Connor.

‘Steph, we met on the ferry. Do you remember? We were the only two not being sick? I fetched you a coffee and…’ – I hesitated, breathing in – ‘and then you stole my pocket-book as we were disembarking.’ As I stuck my hands on my hips and positioned my feet in a stance that planted me firm and tall in front of Steph and Connor, I had no idea that the robe had come apart and my left breast was partly revealed.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said, her half smile obviously suppressed in an attempt not to embarrass me, ‘but I don’t think we’ve met before. And, er, your…’ She pointed a slim, painted fingernail at my exposed chest and might as well have hurled an ice dagger at me.

I tugged the towelling back into place, the shock of revealing my breast considerably less than the surprise that I felt at Steph denying having met me before.

‘You
must
remember,’ I continued. My voice faltered but I refused to let this go. ‘You came and sat next to me as I was writing up my diary and virtually every other passenger was being sick except us. We had a brief chat and then you took out a book and began to read.’ I paused, desperately trying to think what she’d been reading. ‘
To Kill a Mockingbird
,’ I said triumphantly. ‘That’s what you were reading and then you told me about your trip to Paris and the good, sorry,
great
sex that you’d had there.’ If nothing else, I hoped that would turn Connor off her.

I could see Connor shifting uncomfortably next to Steph, probably wondering if I’d had too much wine. ‘Ailey, why don’t you tell Steph about your life in Spain? She’d love to hear.’ A poor attempt at changing the subject and it didn’t prevent me from raising my eyebrows at Steph and waiting for her reply.

‘Nope, sorry,’ she said vaguely. ‘I’m sure I’d remember if I’d seen you. I’m sorry that you think I stole something of yours.’

‘Ailey’s under a bit of pressure, aren’t you Ailey?’ Connor’s voice hardened and, while I was in his home and drinking his wine and wearing his robe, I decided to remain civil. ‘She doesn’t mean anything by it. A case of mistaken identity, I think,’ he added, while I nodded in agreement.

And as a result, my outburst caused two things: enormous self-doubt – perhaps I was going mad – and then Connor placing his hand on Steph’s upper thigh, leaving it there for the next twenty minutes while I regaled her with tales of life in Spain. Both ways, it hurt.

‘And what about you?’ I asked, tired of talking about olives and mountains and university life in Granada. Was it all so foreign to them? ‘What are you doing during your stay on the island?’

‘Work experience in the distillery mainly. Glen Broath has such a fine reputation.’ My stupid question caused Steph to drool adoration all over Connor and he returned an equally sickly-sweet look that told me he enjoyed the flattery. ‘Then I’ll be going back to the Highlands to help my father in his whisky business. I have no brothers.’ Steph and Connor then entertained me with stories about the whisky business and what a struggle it was to keep afloat in the shadow of massive companies. It seemed that Steph’s family business was a few years behind Glen Broath in terms of world trade and Steph was here to learn. Then it struck me that the female figure I had seen earlier in Glen Broath, when I’d sought out Connor in my distressed state, was Steph. It seemed strange that Connor hadn’t mentioned her before, especially as they appeared so close.

‘Like I said,’ I repeated. ‘I’d better be going. It’s a long walk.’

‘Nonsense,’ Connor barked, finally levering himself away from Steph. He stood and took my elbow. ‘Sit and talk and drink more wine and forget your silly walk back to the beach at this hour. Have you seen the weather?’ Connor briefly exposed the night by tugging on the curtain. It was as if someone was squirting a hose pipe at the window.

‘OK,’ I said with a smile. He still cared then. ‘I’ll stay a while longer and hope the storm passes.’

‘No, you’ll stay the night with us and not say another word about it.’

It was as if someone had suddenly opened the window and the hosepipe spray was hitting me directly in the face. A cold, relentless spike of water pounded my forehead and washed away all rationale. The only thought I had was of the word
us
and it rang through my head like the tolling bell on an ocean buoy.

‘Steph is staying with you?’ I think it was a question. Connor could have taken it either way.

‘Yes, of course. Where else did you think she would be staying?’ The last time I’d seen that look was when he was eleven and he’d hidden a naughty magazine in our stables. When it had been discovered and presented to my father, Connor denied all knowledge but sported the same mischievous look as he wore now. Was it only me who realised the implications? Two women, equally attracted to one man, spending the night together. It was the unspoken promise that was alluring. The potential of the night more provocative than the reality.

‘I’ll have to take you up on the offer. The thought of climbing over those rocks in the dark fills me with fear. And the tide will be in about now.’

‘Sense at last. You two get to know each other for a bit. I have to make an important phone call. Do help yourselves, ladies.’ Connor slid the bottle of wine across the table in no particular direction and went into the kitchen, closing the door behind him.

I could feel Steph staring at me even before the waft of breeze that Connor left in his wake had dissipated. The fire crackled and spat behind the glass door but I opened it anyway and nestled another log within the flames. It was something to do other than glare at Steph.

‘Sorry I denied knowing you. I didn’t expect to see you again. I’ve read your diary.’ She curled her legs up underneath her and rested her head on a brown velvet cushion with the most self-satisfied grin I have ever seen on anyone. ‘It’s quite shocking really.’

‘I could report you to the police for pickpocketing.’

‘What, and risk me handing over the evidence?’ She laughed.

‘I want it back.’ This was playground banter except there was no teacher to tell.

‘And what if I haven’t finished with it yet? We’re about three quarters of the way through.’ Steph twisted around on the sofa, her feline movements showing me just how slight she was.

‘We?’ My heart thudded as I poured more wine.

‘It’s been great bedtime reading. I would never have thought that such an innocent-looking person could have such deliciously wayward thoughts. Have you ever actually, you know, done what you’ve written about?’ Steph twirled a strand of silver-blonde hair around her tiny finger and, with widening eyes that were already too large for her small oval face, failed to suppress another giggle.

‘I demand that you give it back now! It’s personal property.’ I stomped about the living room, opening drawers and cupboards looking for my journal. I could barely believe that I’d inadvertently stumbled across the wretched Steph – although that’s the Isle of Man for you – let alone comprehend that my diary had most likely been read by Connor. She said
we
, didn’t she? I would never be able to face him again and the prospect of anything happening between now us had been irrevocably dashed.

‘Sorry, I can’t. It’s not here.’ Steph unfurled herself as Connor returned from the kitchen. ‘But tell you what, I’ll drop it round to you. Connor can tell me where you’re staying.’

And that was it. I knew I wouldn’t get any more from her and didn’t want to cause a fuss in front of Connor. I stared at the floor, unable to look him in the eye in case he realised what we were talking about. I wanted to scream at him and thump him for not confessing that he had read my journal. He couldn’t feign ignorance either, as the book had my name clearly written on the cover and he was aware that I had lost my diary. I mustered courage and turned to his warm, smiling, irresistible face, pretending for all I was worth that he was a repulsive traitor. It didn’t work.

‘How
could
you?’ I whispered. The spitting fire behind me and the steady trickle of water on glass were the only other noises in the breathless room. ‘Connor, how could you?’

And I gathered my belongings and ran out into the rain.

Athol Street clicked with the heels of the lunchtime scurry. Dark suits ducked and twisted with mobiles pressed to their heads in the race for a table at the most popular bistros and café bars.

‘Sorry,’ I said as a young woman in a trouser suit knocked me with her briefcase. I walked along the street, the financial heartbeat of the island, staring up at the immaculate facades of the Victorian buildings that were peppered with more modern constructions where space allowed. It was hard to acknowledge the change that had taken place over the last fourteen years; the memories I had of Douglas, the island’s capital, while on shopping trips with my mother bore no resemblance to what I now saw.

Banks filled with offshore accounts, advocates’ brass plaques and firms of accountants ran up the entire length of the street and spilled into neighbouring streets too, by the looks of the workers that flooded from their offices to wheel and deal over lunch. I made my way, against the flow, to the prestigious building of Macaulay & Fisher Advocates Limited, where I was greeted in a plush reception area, decorated mainly in gold and green, by an immaculately dressed woman in her thirties. Suddenly, I felt very out of place in my walking boots, jeans and waterproof. I caught sight of myself in a gilt-framed mirror and ran a finger beneath my dark-rimmed eyes, while my other hand worked through the mess that was my hair. Judging by my appearance, which was usually fresh and sun-kissed, my mission to reclaim Creg-ny-Varn was taking its toll. I was tired, fed up and, having discovered that Connor already had a girlfriend and had no doubt been reading my journal, I was ready to go home to Spain. I was only keeping the appointment with Lewis because he had shifted other clients around to make time for me.

‘Ailey, you found us.’ His rich voice calmed me and I took a deep breath and stood, blushing as he kissed me slowly on both cheeks in front of the receptionist, who would have been wondering why her boss would want to make contact with someone who looked as if she lived on the street. ‘Come into my office and have some tea.’

Tea sounded good. Proper tea, boiled in a kettle and brewed in a pot with a cosy and stirred with a spoon. Drinking tea from a cup and saucer would be a treat, a biscuit or two a bonus. Lewis didn’t let me down.

‘Thanks,’ I said, the china cup rattling in its saucer. ‘I’ve been dunking teabags into barely hot water that tastes of smoke. As for milk, well, that’s a luxury.’

‘You’re welcome to spend time with us at our place. Liz would be delighted.’ Lewis pushed back his unruly hair. Even dressed in a shirt and trousers, although without a tie, he managed to appear ready for a fishing trip or a day digging the garden. I noticed how his shoulders strained beneath the striped cotton. Then he winked and leaned forward across his desk, his slightly stubbly chin resting in his hands, and whispered, ‘Liz has been very keen to see you again since I told her about our encounter at the beach cottage.’

‘You told her?’

‘Of course. She could hardly contain herself. She wanted to know everything that we’d been up to and I was awake all night describing every detail. She was especially thrilled that we’d spotted her at the window.’

‘I see,’ I said and took a sip of my tea. ‘And she wasn’t –’

‘Jealous? Not at all. She’s been desperate for this for ages.’

‘This?’

‘Another woman, silly. For me to find another woman for us.’ Lewis was stretched across the huge leather-topped desk, his elbows spread wide on top of a stack of files, and the glint in his eyes told me that work on my case was far from his mind.

‘Us?’ I was beginning to sound silly with my monosyllabic replies that curled up at the edges like autumn leaves.

Lewis glanced at his watch. ‘We’ve got about twenty minutes and she’ll be here. Did you enjoy your shopping spree?’

Lewis had kindly driven me into Douglas earlier that morning and dropped me in the shopping area of the town. I had wandered the narrow streets, meandering through expensive boutiques and high-street stores with only enough spare money to buy a plastic cup of hot chocolate. The money that remained in my purse was for food, and the wages from my cleaning job, although I had yet to see any money, would be my return fare home.

‘Yes, thanks, although I didn’t buy anything.’ I had walked slowly up to the offices of Macaulay & Fisher, hoping to use up some of the time Lewis thought I desired in the shops.

‘That certainly doesn’t make sense,’ he joked. ‘Liz can’t go near a clothes shop without having the urge to strip and try everything on. And you can guarantee that she’ll step out of the changing cubicle in skimpy undies just to ask me something pointless. She’s not happy unless she’s had at least three strangers see her body each day.’ Lewis grinned and leaned back in his leather chair, perhaps uncomfortable from the tightening within his trousers. ‘Once she even took me back into the changing rooms with her and leaned over a stool while I –’

My shocked expression interrupted him. He began to rifle through the papers on his desk and located a clean notebook. He cleared his throat.

‘Right, tell me everything you’ve found out so far about Ethan Kinrade. Any detail, however small, may be useful.’ Lewis looked me straight in the eye. ‘Although I have to tell you honestly, Ailey, I don’t hold out much hope. If your father’s wish was for his estate to go to Mr Kinrade then –’

‘I understand,’ I said. ‘Let’s get to work.’

Picking over the bones of what I had discovered about Kinrade was, after fifteen minutes or so, proving fruitless. While Lewis was patient and took notes about everything I revealed, none of the information was particularly useful when it came to putting together a case.

‘Is there anything else you can think of? Anything that may go against his character?’

‘There’s the library,’ I offered and pulled a face. ‘He’s pretty much turned it into a kinky bondage room.’ I was saddened that the beautiful room had been desecrated but also secretly wished that I’d had the chance to mess around in it with Dominic when he’d caught me spying in the basement. Plenty of time yet, I thought.

‘I’m not sure there’s a law against that unless he had a hoard of young beauties tied up against their will.’ Lewis pushed back in his chair and ran the end of his pen along his lips. ‘Ailey, if I were you, I’d simply confront the man and talk to him about how you feel. I really don’t think you have a case for kicking him out of his home but you may appeal to his humane side if you voice your feelings to him.’

‘A possibility, I suppose, but the wretched man’s always away from the island.’ Lewis was right. Seeing the flimsy facts about Ethan Kinrade spread out in black and white made me realise how futile it all was.

‘I’m not sure that’s true. I saw him again today. He was buying the newspaper at the local shop when I went out to fetch milk.’

‘Kinrade?’

‘He said good morning to me. So you see, introduce yourself and in all probability you’ll find yourself as a guest at Creg-ny-Varn with Mr Kinrade behaving perfectly reasonably.’ To indicate just how serious he was about his suggestion, Lewis closed his notebook and pushed it aside. The intercom buzzed.

‘Your wife’s here, Mr Macaulay. Shall I send her straight in?’

Lewis grinned and rose from his chair, confirming that his wife should join them. When he greeted Liz, I noticed the expensive cloth of his suit trousers pull snugly around his well-shaped bottom. His shirt, too, stretched across the sheets of his back muscle as he wrapped his arms around his wife’s body, squashing her large breasts between them. They kissed without a care for my presence, a deep kiss which implied an urgent need that wouldn’t wait.

‘Ailey, how nice to see you again.’ Liz smiled and allowed Lewis to relieve her of several shopping bags from designer boutiques.

‘Anything nice?’ Lewis took a peek into one of the bags and looked up grinning. ‘Hmm,’ he said. ‘You got me a present.’

‘Would you like to see?’ Liz didn’t wait for an answer nor, it seemed, was she particularly aware of my presence any more because she dashed into Lewis’s private bathroom and returned only a minute later virtually naked.

‘Whoa!’ Lewis steadied himself on the desk.

Liz was wearing the sexiest, most alluring lingerie that I had ever seen. Personally, I was used to wearing simple white thongs or perhaps a black one in the evening and I often went braless. My entire wardrobe consisted of little more than loose skirts – many of them see-through for Marco’s benefit – and a few tight-fitting tops that emphasised the neat shape of my breasts. In the cooler months, I snuggled within soft sweaters and jeans.

But what Liz was wearing had not only taken Lewis’s breath away and most likely any thoughts of the afternoon’s work, but had also rendered me motionless, aside from my quickening pulse, as I realised that I wanted to be the one who peeled off the delicate slivers of lace and replace them with my mouth.

‘That’s so pretty,’ I offered in an attempt to break the silence as Liz posed before us. ‘I love the colour.’

‘The fabric’s beautiful too. Come and feel the quality.’ Liz beckoned me over and I quickly realised that refusing would result in her insisting and then I would look silly and shy if I didn’t, and besides, my fingers were tingling at the prospect of a small touch, perhaps just below her breast or around the rim of her panties. I remembered my diary and realised that it was happening again. I wondered if every time I found myself sexually mixed-up since my return to the island, Connor and Steph were reading through the pages of my journal. It was entirely possible and gave me both pleasure and pain to think of them engrossed in each other’s bodies after an extra dose of my fantasies. But while my writings had brought them together and opened up a new world of sexual possibility for me, Connor seemed further away than ever.

Slowly, I approached Liz and raised my hand to her ribs. I connected with the lilac chantilly of the lace-up corset, feeling the warmth of her skin beneath the delicate panels. She was right and even I, who was not familiar with such items, could feel its beauty. Her beauty.

‘It’s under-wired as well, to keep me in place.’ Liz took my hand and slid it under the weight of her breast. ‘Feel how it lifts me.’ She took both of my hands and cupped my palms around her soft, round flesh.

I heard something from Lewis, a small moan of approval, and Liz too made a throaty noise when I allowed my thumb to wander up to the brown outline of her nipple, barely visible through the lace. I’d seen all this before in print, of course, in women’s monthly magazines left behind by our British lodgers. Sexy women in unattainable lingerie had always intrigued me: not because I wanted to strive to become them, as many young women aimed and usually failed to do, but as an inspiration for lust. A brief need for their bodies to be within reach. I wanted to touch and explore and do the things to them that Marco had done to me. I wanted to know what I felt like.

As my thumbs lingered on the dark circles of her breast, the buds of her nipples pushed up and out, causing a tiny rise beneath the patterned lace. I traced a line along the scalloped edge of the bra cup, leading up to the satin shoulder strap. Liz was wearing a velvet choker in deep purple and a cluster of gold chains with a glittering cross dangling between her almost spherical breasts.

‘Was it expensive?’ I whispered because I knew my voice would fail me.

‘Terribly,’ she giggled, eyeing Lewis for a second.

I stood back, causing a brief flash of concern to spread over her face, but when she realised I was simply appreciating her from different angles, she began to pose and show off her new extravagance. I stepped behind her and was pleased to see that her bottom was as full and rounded as her bust. Liz had a tiny waist, which emphasised her curves perfectly. She possessed a typical hourglass figure set upon pretty legs, dressed up with an ankle chain and mauve suede court shoes, the heels of which brought her a couple of inches below my height. I reached out and rested my hands in the small of her back, just above the band of skin between the edge of the corset and the hairline strap of her thong. Slowly, I brushed my hands over her skin and its barely-there covering of blonde hair, and passed around to the sides of her ass-cheeks – the flawless expanses of flesh that I longed to nibble and bite.

‘The thing about pretty lingerie, though,’ Liz said as I cradled her buttocks, ‘is that it never lasts very long. It took me all morning to choose these items, the stockings included, and I’m certain that Lewis will rip them off me in a matter of seconds later on.’

‘What makes you think I’ll wait until later?’ The male voice was obtrusive in what should have been an entirely female exchange.

‘Typical,’ I replied, grinning. ‘You look absolutely gorgeous and deserve to be worshipped and adored for hours.’ I briefly touched her corset, her panties, her stockings. ‘I’d love something like this.’ With that, I let go of her bottom and came to her side, reminding her how drab and practical I looked in my outdoor clothes and tied-back hair. ‘For now, this is what I’m stuck with and I barely feel like a woman. I was lucky enough to take a bath yesterday but that was the first in a long time. How I would love to straighten my hair and wear tarty red lipstick and dress up in underwear like yours!’

I only said all this because I was thinking of Connor and Steph entwined in front of the fire, my journal between them and their bodies ready to act out my secret fantasies. I was turning into that person again, the one who ends up in naughty, unthinkable trouble.

‘Then you must go back to our house with Liz and be pampered from head to toe.’ Lewis stood and adjusted his trousers. Without doubt, I noticed a bulge behind his zipper. It was strange to think that he had buried that same erection within me, while his wife made do with a vibrator and the hope that we were watching her. It was an unspoken tease.

‘Yes, Ailey, come home with me and let me give you a treatment you’ll never forget.’ Liz squealed at the suggestion and went back into the bathroom to dress. I was slightly disappointed that my brief touches hadn’t lured her into a naughty display for Lewis’s benefit but settled upon the promise of being pampered back at her house.